Thoughts on Ludwig von Mises's Lectures to His "Inferiors"
Arianne Emory, Administrator of Reseune on Cyteen around Lalande 46650 in Union, speaks:
Absolutely essential... are adequately diverse [human] genepools. We do not create Thetas because we want cheap labor. We create Thetas because they are an essential and important part of human alternatives. The ThR-23 hand-eye coordination, for instance, is exceptional. Their psychset lets them operate very well in environments in which geniuses would assuredly fail. They are tough, ser, in ways I find thoroughly admirable, and I recommend you, if you ever find yourself in a difficult [wilderness] situation... hope your companion is a ThR... who will survive, ser, to perpetuate his type, even if you do not...
Daniel Kuehn:
Facts & other stubborn things: Further thoughts on Mises and the line "you are inferior": There is an inherent ability distribution… augmented by the acquisition of human and social capital… s a function of the wealth of that person's family and society but also as a function of the initial inherent ability distribution. Together, that creates a skill distribution…. People in the [upper] tails… enrich our lives.
This is all fine.
However, to the extent that I am talented in this sense, if I ever talk about people who are to the left of me on a given skills distribution where I excel (remember, there are many distributions) as "inferior" people, somebody please take me aside, give me a good walloping, and talk some sense into me.
When you go from talking about skills distributions to talking about whole groups of people being "inferior" then something is very, very wrong - at least in my opinion (and I happen to think that opinion is right, otherwise I wouldn't be holding it).
This, of course, doesn't even get into the question of how much value is generated by comparative rather than absolute advantage. A lot of the value we enjoy is generated by people that are rather to the left of the skill distribution relevant to the skills they are applying to production.
